Saturday, 20 December 2014

I'm one of those people who wanders around with earphones in all the time. I'm also one of those people who thinks about what things 'mean', and this stupid, simple habit of mine is no exception. I've written before about the aesthetics of nature, and it occurred to me when I was writing the essay I culled that from back in the spring that it would be interesting to apply this to the urban landscape, which I shall do at a later date, as well as the natural (read 'natural' as exactly what you think I mean by 'natural'). This, in turn, lead me to dwell on the observation that when we're dealing with what we may call environmental-ambient aesthetics, the aesthetics of the locale, technology has allowed us to introduce the dimension of music to it in a way that was not previously possible.

In essence: we can literally add a soundtrack to our lives.

Of course, the urban and rural landscapes have never been devoid of music. There has always been the solitary walker whistling, the Salvation Army band on their brass instruments in the town square, even the bird singing. However, these are obviously and distinctly public affairs. The band playing music, or the walker whistling, or the bird singing, invites the other to listen, either directly or indirectly- by which I mean, the whistling walker is most likely whistling for themselves, while the brass band are playing music for the public. Even if the headphoned walker sings along, listening to music like this is a distinctly private affair. It is something occurring for (and being controlled by) solely the subject.

As such, the music chosen by the subject can potentially transform the simple act of strolling through town into a cinematic experience. It provides an element of distance and unreality that renders the lived experience an observed experience, in the same sense in that we observe the images on the cinema screen. Depending upon the choice of music deployed this sense of unreality can be exaggerated still further, in much the same sense the soundtrack of the movie sets the tone of the scene.

Except the movie is our lives.

I remember a few years ago I was introduced to the music of Joy Division. I would have been about 18, and I got into the habit of walking around the nice, friendly suburb I live in at night, listening to Ian Curtis wailing. I find walking around at night a pretty evocative experience anyway, but having that music, so cold and wintry and raw with me, informing my feelings as it helped shape them, the experience transformed into something new and distinct. It wouldn't be accurate to say that this use of music turns our subjective experiences into artworks, but it certainly makes them into something like artworks.

Digital music technology undermines the notion that the artwork, in this case the piece of music, is defined by its separability from the rest of lived experience, that it is something that reveals itself only in particular ways and in particular places. It is certainly an uprooting of music, a displacement of it, even a democratisation of it. It is not dissimilar to how home media and the Internet have undermined the cinema. As is ever the case, the unholy pair of technological innovation and the capitalist profit motive have opened up new landscapes of experience for us. One wonders what new vistas are still yet to come...

Friday, 19 December 2014

The Holy Language of the Tropes has given us this wonderful expression (which describes at least some of the music I listen to regularly, for better or worse), and that got me thinking...(Goes without saying I'm not suggesting that any of these musicians actually are Neoreactionaries, but I've never let something as inconvenient as the facts get in the way of a good time)
A while ago, someone (I think Hurlock but I'm far too decadent and indolent to leaf back through all of those Chaos Patches to find it) suggested this as an anthem for NRx. Admittedly, I can well imagine the huddled masses standing in devastated awe before their corporate overlords as Japanese danger-noise barks out of the loudspeakers ringing the Palace of Optimates, but what other fine pieces of music would be appropriately inspirational, or at least appropriately harrowing?

Here are my candidates:

Meltdown, the rather pleasing musical adaptation of Mr Land's essay of the same name, would be the most obvious choice if I were in charge, but it might be a little too long to play at the Olympics.

Respect the Hierarchy by Von Thronstahl would probably appeal to certain currents of NRx, but might be a little too Hyperborean for some.

Hate Us And See If We Mind by Rome (who are pretty obviously both on the Left and the finest neofolk musicians around today) would be appropriate for the title alone, but seeing as it's one of the central tracks on their beautiful new album about the collapse of white-minority rule in the former Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, (A Passage To Rhodesia, which you must all buy at once) it even carries a secessionist spirit.

Though, putting its obvious Leftism to one side, I think that this might be the most suitable, as long as you replace 'anarchy' with 'monarchy.'

Monday, 8 December 2014

I started a new job last week (my first since graduation!), and as such I'm really not sure how regularly I'll be updating this for at least the next month. Considering how irregular my postings on here are anyway, that could easily mean there'll be no new content until the beginning of next year. I'm hoping that after a week or so of work I'll enter into a kind of equilibrium and be able to summon up the time and energy to write on at least a monthly basis.

Whether not that will happen, I don't know.

Hopefully, there'll be at least one more post this month, which will just be a look back on the last year, and maybe a 'listicle' where I go through my favourite reads of 2014.

I've been toying with a few ideas for my next 'proper' post on here too: Neoreaction as politicised Nietzscheanism; a self-rebuttal to my previous post on equality; a vague attempt at a phenomenlogy of moral experience; something about idolatry and the philosophical concern with the detrimental effects of art. There'll also be more Reports on the Reactosphere, starting with NRx's take on Islam.

I'm also hoping for a general increase in the quality of what I write here.

About Me

Any views or opinions presented are mine and not those of my employer. I may chose to discuss things, people and ideas that are unsavoury to others -- this should not be read as an endorsement of these things, ideas or people unless said so explicitly.